Stice - Stice’s Satyricon Review
Welcome to one of a kind Stice’s feats of fetishes. We got spiced up rap as a starter, speedy electronica for main and a very weirdly looking dessert. Dig in, it’s disgusting.
When Caroline Bennett aka Crab (formerly of Kiddy Pool, later Machine Girl), and producer Jake Lichter aka Jark (of Maine experimental rock trio Lunch Cult) have joined forces a few years ago, they had to cook up something completely nuts. Everyone, welcome to the Stice universe where all your desires and urges would be turned up times thousand and endlessly erupting to your satisfaction. Imagine if Death Grips, SOPHIE and 100 gecs would get absolutely smashed, closed themselves in studio by accident and out of despair have started to collaborate, the sound would be Stice. Now, the duo is back with a brand-new album, ‘Stice’s Satyricon’.
After the few first seconds of ‘Ollygoshawda’, we realise that what is about to unfold here is closer to an electronic hell on wheels than a cohesive album. ‘I Need Cash!!’, a nod to Crab’s favourite childhood band Hella, only confirms the prediction and goes off the rails of the breakcore. It’s as if some nasty punk spirit would take over their souls to blabber all night about some big ass, pussy and overall paranoia. ‘Honk If You’re Honky’ put us in an after-after-after party state where nobody really knows what’s happening but everything’s hilarious so we’re also honking, can you hear? If not, it’s because ‘I Piss Myself’ smashed our speakers. It’s like a homage on speed to early 00s MySpace recorded by someone who had really understood that urgency when you just have to go take a leak, have ADHD and your favourite tune is on.
While ‘Touch The Cloth’ slowed down a bit, well downgraded from 666% to 100%, ‘Boogie On My Funky Grave’ pick the tempo up with no hesitation. Crab doesn’t care if you’re in the mood for craziness. It’s an order. Either you’ll indulge in the rigged craziness or get bored in silence. Stice gives a life-long fun-times guarantee that covers the rest of the album. ‘Limp Image’ gears up in shattered hip-hop stanzas and fizzing beats. Title track named after the Greek gladiator picaresque by Petronius, ‘Satyricon’ stretches out the limit of absurdity. We got served never-ending bubbly glitches to beautifully obscene lyrics like ’Every time I pee, I cum religiously’. Amen.
Blissful already, we got thrown into a half-robotic, half-human state of ‘Killer Zero’. Its metallic melody cuts slowly through upper bouncy layers, preparing us for the final circle of this messed-up, sci-fi hell aka ‘Screaming Like Shittt’. Stice goes off and on, faster and slower with no regard for any sort of order. It’s meant to be blasted out on big-ass speakers at your friends’ dodgy underground venue so you can drown into this digital realm of chaos. In ‘Stice’s Satyricon’ everything’s hyper.
Stice is a real-life embodiment of your most disgusting fantasies and fetishes you’d only share on shady online forums and during delusional druggy nights where you’re on the verge of having a blast and blowing your head off. They make filth fascinating, frantically running from one extreme to another, skipping genres to jump into a digital rabbit hole leading to a twisted out of proportions wicked Wonderland. Let’s go, Alice. There’s nothing to lose anymore.